Category: Raznay’s Adventures

SL12B — or the Second Life® 12th Birthday — isn’t exactly news to anyone at this point.
Pretty much everyone has talked about it at one time or another over the last month. The talk has increased over the last few days as things start to go up a notch in anticipation of the event opening on Sunday 21st June 2015 at 12pm noon.

Just a reminder for those of us in the southern hemisphere it will be open early Monday morning. In fact, let’s be uber specific, 5am AEST on 22nd June will be 12pm SLT (PDT) 21st June.

Frustrations aside, the Second Life 12th Birthday is set to be amazing! By all accounts it will be bigger than previous years, but better? Well that’s up to you! The dreams are in the eyes of the beholder after all!
If that wasn’t an obvious lead in to the theme I’m not sure what is. This year the Second Life® birthday celebrations are centred around the theme What Dreams May Come.
This is a pretty broad theme and one that has definitely inspired a lot of different interpretations.

The Welcome Station. He’s definitely welcoming don’t you think!?

By now you may have noticed my photo’s.Sigh.
Most of the photo’s I was able to grab (aside from the last one) were taken at the welcome area. Partly because I was a little hung up on the ghost-esque train — it looks like Slimer from Ghostbusters and I’m not even sure if that was intentional but I love it and you should absolutely check it out if you’re even the tiniest bit geek — but mostly because my graphics card is giving up the ghost, pun intended, and copious amounts of tears ensued as I tried to snap more photo’s and couldn’t.

The Welcome Station stairs. I fell in love with this view.

I did however, still make the most of my early access by jumping on the Pod Tour and learning about some of the exhibits, history of Second Life® and the venues at SL12B.
It’s a pretty nifty little tour and was set up by the original owner/creator, Yavanna Llanfair, of the first ever pods in Second Life®.
I’m pretty sure I just butchered that explanation so you’ll just have to go along and check it out for yourself.

Like everything in Second Life® it’s only as good as you deem it to be. Some things will not fit with your aesthetic while other things will sing you the song of its people. It’s entirely up to you how you perceive, enjoy, learn or grow from this experience.

To keep up to dates with the news, events and talks that will be held at the Dreamitarium and the other venues around the place check out the official SL Community Celebration website.
Psst, all of the photo’s in this post link back to their site as well, just in case.

It was purely by accident that I stumbled into the 1920’s Berlin Project and found myself seated at this table.
You see, I was unceremoniously evicted from my comfy Pod Tour seat — thanks evil lag monster — and I was feeling a little hurt and rejected. So I thought I’d try to get my bearings and find my way back to Slimer the ghost train, since he seemed genuinely happy to see me (even if that was just to gobble me up).

Then I saw this gentleman sitting on a beach looking at photographs that were floating before him. All of the photographs together made up this one beautiful, yet sad, scene. It was exquisite. I thought I might sit down next to him — he isn’t real, don’t worry — and ponder the beauty of the people in these photographs.

So I right clicked and selected “sit”.
All good right?
Of course not! There wouldn’t be a story if it worked the way I expected it to!

Instead of sitting next to this man I found myself transported into the photograph, sitting at someone’s kitchen table. I sat there for a long while. Initially I was too shocked to move. I wasn’t expecting to be transported into something real like this. I wasn’t expecting to find myself face to face with the realities of life in 1920’s Berlin.

I began to feel anxious sitting there, like something terrible was going to happen. Perhaps I’d just be asked to leave? Or maybe some unidentified military personnel would barge into this tiny immaculate kitchen and destroy it?
Yes, I know it’s not that particular time in history, it’s pre-Nazi era, but I still had that sense of foreboding regardless.

This little kitchen, and my happy little accident in being here, transported me to another time. This exhibit does amazing things with the power of pixels. It moved me in a way I wasn’t sure I could be moved in Second Life®. For that I am so very grateful.

I won’t keep going because I have a lot more to explore before I start the next phase of my participation in SL12B: The Dreamy Hostess!

If you see me around please feel free to say hello! (I won’t always be working while I’m there! For those wondering why you’d have to say hello to a greeter).

Like this:

Every so often I look at my inventory and wonder “what are the five things that I’d miss if Second Life® ate them?”

Occasionally I can answer that question and stick to only five items. Other times the list basically ends up being my entire inventory. In a peculiar way the latter is one of the ways I notice I’m having a bad day because I don’t want to part with anything as it’s all too important. The emotional bonds that tie me — to even pixel things — can be quite strong. This is usually the time I employ every trick in the book to self soothe, disconnect from the matrix internet for a little while and just get in touch with me again.

After watching the movie Leap Year last weekend with the Eidann I was spurred into action writing my Top Five Favourite Things. At least they’re my favourite things for this month. Okay, maybe this week. Fine! Maybe they’re just my favourite things for today!

MishMish My Desk Mailbox in Orchid — because this thing is adorable and every time I sit at my other desk my mailbox makes me smile! It’s a little piece of me in a corporate world

Cheeky Pea ottoman — because pink is one of my favourite colours and I am totally on a Moroccan kick in both worlds and I love this so much I wish I had one in real life so I can sit on it and hand write my blogs!

And because I am awesome I thought I’d also add my Top Seven Favourite Things in Real Life. I mean, clearly I like to write lists so why not just go all out and add another list with two bonus favourites?!
It’s okay, I know you’ll thank me when you’ve read them all!

Coffee!! — I wasn’t kidding when I wrote something about coffee in all of my profiles, everywhere. It even filtered into some of my real life profiles! Oops!

Falling asleep listening to the rain — actual rain, not the rain that plays on my sleep cycle app. Although that rain works too when there’s no real rain!

Compliments — both giving them and receiving them. As you’re probably well aware my interpersonal skills aren’t the greatest — Oh Em Gee Raz, no way! — so when I actually notice something and mention how lovely someone looks, or take a moment to appreciate a nice thing someone has done, I feel almost human! While I do like getting compliments I’m not very good at receiving them. I usually end up responding with a compliment (which is apparently an okay thing to do) or kind of squirming in my chair until the awkward moment has passed.

Kitty cuddles — if you have a cat then you know all to well how aloof they can be. When a cat loves you, and wants cuddles or belly rubs, you know you’re a very special human to them. I guess I just like being reminded that I’m a good human from time to time!

Movie dates (at home) with the Eidann — we love spending time together and relaxing. I love curling up together and experiencing the wonders of Netflix Australia, which is still quite terrible — it doesn’t even have The Craft or Clueless! We usually end up watching a random movie in the hopes it might be interesting. Mostly we end up watching something really good, occasionally we end up with something horrible

Makeup — I love makeup with a passion! I’d love to say I’ve got some talent applying it but I’d be totally lying! It doesn’t really matter because I enjoy learning new techniques and being introduced — via YouTube Makeup Guru videos usually — to new fascinating, and often hugely over priced, products. The joy is in the learning rather than the final result!

Notebooks — the kind you write or draw in rather than the computer version. Like pens, I have an ever growing stash of notebooks that I can barely bring myself to use! They’re all too special — even the generic ones — for me to ruin with benign ideas or idle writing. They need to have an amazing purpose! I may even group particular pens with special notebooks…

Ottoman Pose – Enlapped

That’s it! Two whole lists of my favourite things in Second Life® and real life! I suppose I could have added my penchant for lists, which is entirely new for me, but I felt that was a little too obvious!
What are some of your favourite things?
Let me know in the comments!

Like this:

I tend to have a hard time looking at the good things in life, the bright side of life for my Monty Python-ites out there — *waves* — so I thought I would write a list of all the unicorn* things that have happened in the last week that have made me smile.
*By unicorn, I mean mysteriously magical mythical things.

My new friend K’s awesomeness by making my Sailor Moon pose for free. And for no other reason than she wanted to help me out. Who does that these days?! Thank you again K! So much!!

Conversations on Twitter, because they have been keeping me sane in their madness. Bacon is now a religion and porking someone is totally not what you think!

First ever early access to a fair (Shiny Shabby), thanks to [SL] Blogger Support. I actually had no idea that group is granted early access to some fairs and events. I’d probably have been too terrified to apply if I’d known that!!

Ever Afterr. Yeah she totes gets a mention because somehow she completes me!

Being told by co-workers and boss ladies that I’ve done an amazing job with my internship!

Spending Geek Pride Day being awesome and watching movies with the Eidann.

I couldn’t imagine this many wonderful things happening even if I tried!
That’s not to say amazing things don’t happen to me. They most definitely do! I am usually oblivious to them. Plus, more often than not, I talk myself out of things because I rarely feel like I’m good enough.

For instance, I’m chomping at the bit to get my blog on some feeds and to get some blogging applications in. However, most feeds and blogging applications require a minimum blog age of 3 months; I still have a little under two months to go.
At the same time I’m terrified of applying for either because, like many people, I’m afraid of rejection. I’m afraid of the never-hearing-anything or, worse, correspondence telling me I’m terrible unsuccessful at this time.

Because one instance is never enough, here’s another. When I finally decided to apply for the internship with VIRTUALVillage Media it took me a week to build up the courage just to hit submit on the application! I’m not exaggerating either. It might have been a few days more than a week if I’m truly honest.
I decided to copy all of the questions in the application into a document and I sat there every day for that week working on my responses; editing, tweaking, fixing and lots of coffee and a fair amount of swearing later I finally let it go and hit “submit”.
And then I spent the next few days in a panic because I was so damn sure they’d have far better candidates than I lined up.
“That’s okay” I told myself. And it was because I had done something I’d never done before; I hit submit.

In case you’re wondering, I did get the internship at VIRTUALVillage Media and I love it more than I love coffee. And I really love coffee.

During the the last week I have finally figured out that patience is actually quite rewarding. The internship, the blogging for Body Art Hunt and being accepted as a greeter for the SL12B celebrations were all applied for days, weeks and even a month before I heard confirmation or was accepted. You can probably tell that patience has never been my strongest suit. I’m getting there, slowly.

And, while I patiently wait for my minimum three month blog age, I can take my time reading through the feeds and events and pick the ones that best suit me and my brand. I suppose I shouldn’t really say it like that, as if I’m being some picky snob. I guess I am to an extent, this is my brand and my blog that I am building and spending so much time working on. This is the thing I love to do so yeah, I will be picky and I will strive for being added and accepted to the feeds and bloggers groups that inspire me to not only write but to be more than ordinary.

Whether or not that’s achievable, who knows. All I do know is that I am excited about all these wonderful things happening and I’m looking forward to seeing what other wonders will unfold.

I hope you’ve had many wonderful things to smile about this week. Let me know in the comments!

Like this:

While my blog is still in its infancy I thought I would take the time right at the outset to write some posts to help you get to know me a little better.
I think it’s important to get to know the person behind the blog, or in this case the pixels, as it helps to understand them and their quirks. For instance, my humour is often misunderstood and because of this I have found myself being extra careful of what I say and how I say it.
As you can imagine this makes writing quite difficult, at best. At worst it’s actually stopped me from writing because the “best bits” end up being so heavily edited they’re no longer good.
Eventually I have realised that if you get to know me and some of my quirks then my writing won’t be so, well, stunted and choppy. Instead, it can flow like a beautiful river on her way to the sea.

Yeah, I agree there shall be no more rambling, or attempts at anything resembling poetry, let’s jump right into:

10 things I wish people knew about me

I’m shy — in fact I am almost painfully shy, even in Second Life. I hide behind cuteness, geekiness and some false bravado, but underneath it all I am a shy little kitten scared of her own shadow. This also happens to make me incredibly awkward.

I spent time, in my early days, as a dancer — basically I know how to emote quite well. I choose to keep my emotes PG because I’m not interested in pixel sex.

I’m sensitive — this isn’t such a stretch given I’ve done a pretty poor job of hiding it. I don’t subscribe to the “it’s weak” view of wearing your heart on your sleeve, instead I view it as one of my greatest strengths; it makes me empathic, caring and loyal.

Solitude, I crave it — while I enjoy spending time with people and relish their happy vibes and excitement, I crave time with my own thoughts.

Sarcasm is my BFF — I use sarcasm a lot. We understand each other. We’re basically inseparable. Don’t worry, I’ll always let you know when I am being sarcastic as I realise what sounds sarcastic to me doesn’t always translate in the written word.

I notice more than people realise — I’m forever being asked “who told you that?” when I point out something I’ve noticed. I can see, I can read and I am really good at learning people’s inflections in their typing.

I’m easily distracted — pretty shiny things *runs off*

I have a lot of pet peeves — most of them I’m not very good at keeping to myself. If you’d like to witness me vent about my pet peeves feel free to follow me on Plurk.

Romantic comedies make me sad — I’m not actually sure why but they are really depressing and just end up making me cry, a lot.

I write most of my posts in Evernote while lying in bed, just before I’m about to fall asleep — because that’s when my brain is the most active when it comes to posts and what to write, so I write — okay type — until I fall asleep with my phone in my hand.

If you feel like answering your own 10 things you wish people knew about you, you can write your own post — don’t forget to link it in the comments — or list them in the comments.